ORIGINS
Originally bred as utility horse, the Tennessee Walking Horse is best suited for a recreational mount due to its smooth, easy ride and its gentle disposition. A calm, docile temperament, combined with naturally smooth and easy gaits insure the popularity of the Tennessee Walking Horse as the "World's Greatest Show, Trail, and Pleasure Horse.

 

A light horse breed founded in middle Tennessee, this breed is a composition of Standardbred, Thoroughbred, Morgan, and American Saddlebred stock. Tennessee Walking Horses generally range from 14.3 to 17 hands and weigh 900 to 1200 pounds. The modern Tennessee Walking Horse possesses a pretty head with small, well placed ears. The horse has a long sloping shoulder,
a long sloping hip, a fairly short back and short, strong coupling. The bottom line is longer than the top line, allowing for a long stride. Tennessee Walking Horses come in all colors and a variety of patterns. The diverse color choices are sure to please any horse enthusiast. Different colors should not be discriminated against.

GAITS
The Tennessee Walking Horse performs three distinct gaits: the flat foot walk, running walk, and canter. These three are the gaits for which the Tennessee Walking Horse is famous, with the running walk being an inherited, natural gait unique to this breed. Many Tennessee Walking Horses are able to perform the rack, stepping pace, fox-trot, single-foot and other variations of the famous running walk. While not desirable in the show ring, the above mentioned gaits are smooth, easy, trail riding
gaits.

The flat walk is a brisk, long-reaching walk that can cover from four to eight miles an hour. This is a four cornered gait with each of the horse's feet hitting the ground separately at regular intervals. A Tennessee Walking Horse will nod it's head in rhythm with the cadence of it's feet. This nodding head motion, along with overstride, are two features that are unique to the Tennessee Walking Horse.

The running walk is the gait for which the walking horse is most noted. This extra-smooth, gliding gait is basically the same as the flat walk with a noticeable difference in the rate of speed between the two gaits. The breed can travel 10 to 20 miles per hour at this gait. As the speed is increased, the horse over-steps the front track with the back by a distance of six to eighteen inches. The more "stride" the horse has, the better "walker" it is considered to be. It is this motion that gives the rider a feeling of gliding through the air as if propelled by some powerful but smooth-running machine. Since their gaits are easy for them to perform, some walking horses relax certain muscles while executing the
running-walk; they may flop their ears in rhythm; some may even snap their teeth. The running walk is a smooth, easy gait for both horse and rider. The third gait is the canter, which is a collected gallop. The canter is performed in much the same way as other breeds, but the walking horse
seems to have a more relaxed way of performing this gait. In the canter, the horse gives one the abundance of ease with lots of spring and rhythm, with proper rise and fall to afford a thrill from sitting in the saddle. Thus, the canter lifts the front end giving an easy rise and fall motion much like rocking chair. This is often referred to as the "rocking-chair" gait.

HISTORY

The gracefulness and pure pleasure of riding a Tennessee Walking Horse was the distinct purpose in the creation of such a tremendous breed. Plantation owners used horses to travel fields, observe crops, and supervise the working of vast acreage. The long days of riding on an average horse, with its "up and down" movement, caused a great deal of discomfort. Because of this, riders of that era wanted a horse that not only possessed endurance, but also the smoothest of rides.

Bred mainly from Standardbred, Morgan, and Thoroughbred stock, the Tennessee Walking Horse has developed, after years of refinement, into one of the smoothest riding horses in the world. The three, easy-riding gaits of this breed: the flat-foot walk, the running walk, and the canter, are
all natural, inherited characteristics, easily recognized even in a young foal as it walks alongside its mother.

The gliding sensation of the Tennessee Walking Horse is not it's only benefit. In the beginning, this breed was a utility horse, used for plowing fields and to ride on hunts. Hooked to buggies, it took families to church and the county fair. It was practical. Today, the horse is no
longer a necessity, but a source of pleasure, providing the same gentle ride as it did to owners of long ago. And the same sense of pride.Smooth riding. Versatile. Both combined with a gentle disposition that makes the Tennessee Walking Horse a favorite among people around the world. This breed's gentleness puts the most timid rider at ease, gives the small child comfort. A horse of good nature, of loyal companionship and portraying in all ways, gentleness.

The Tennessee Walking Horse. An affordable breed. An enjoyable ride. A loyal companion. Qualities that place this breed in a class of its own. Its gentle disposition, its dependability, its intelligence.
Characteristics that make your Tennessee Walker a life-time friend.

Trigger, Jr., probably Roy Roger's best friend, was a Tennessee Walking Horse. Gene Autry, Darrell Waltrip, and Olivia Newton-John have also found companionship with a Tennessee Walking Horse.More than anything else, these companions are a pleasure to ride. Owners enjoy keeping them in their back yard, riding them in their fields, and otherwise enjoying their horses.

 

Compiled by Mrs. Sis Osborne
COURTESY TWHBEA

 

 

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What on Earth is a Tennessee Walking Horse?
 
 
VOICE OF THE TENNESSEE WALKING HORSE
(A monthly magazine devoted exclusively to this breed)
 
Editor, BEN A. GREEN
Author—"THE BIOGRAPHY"
Tech. Advisor, JOHN  B. CURLEY
SHELBYVILLE, TENN.
March 19, 1962
The Editor—Boston Globe, Boston, Massachusetts

Dear Sir:
A friend tells me your newspaper on Dec. 9, 1961, carried a letter to the Editor from one S. F. Perkins of Cambridge, Massachusetts, who wrote: "I heard that a Boston man sold a Tennessee Walking Horse by advertising in the Globe. What on earth, if I may ask, is a Tennessee Walking Horse?" I do not know the answer given this reader. But as Editor-Publisher of the Voice of the Tennessee Walking Horse, monthly magazine, and author of the book—Biography of the Ten¬nessee Walking Horse—published in December, 1960, and now in its second edition, I would like to satisfy the mind of Mr. Perkins and doubtless many thousands of other Globe readers.

The best description of the Tennessee Walking Horse I ever read was written 15 years ago by the late Gilbert M. Orr of Columbia, Tenn., a man who lived in a wheel chair because of infantile paralysis—but an immensely brave and dedicated soul. He described this horse with 2,000 words. I will offer you a 500-word abstract of his statement: "If you chance to be one in whose heart there is an innate or an acquired love for a horse of good conformation and admirable performance, of gentle manners, high intelligence and loyalty and whose nature is for faithful service; if your sporting blood courses a bit faster at the exhibition of sufficient style for smart looks, and if you admire sheer game-ness combined with even temper and long endurance—then you should meet and know the Tennessee Walking Horse which has been at home amid the rolling hills and bluegrass pastures of Middle Tennessee for more than a hundred years . . .
 
"This superb animal, today 'the world's greatest pleasure horse/ is no mere accident. It is the product of a century of judicious breeding which has resulted in a marked degree of intelligence, a docile disposition, three free and easy gaits, and a large general utilitarian purpose . . .

"The Tennessee Walking Horse has truly served its breeders and its owners 'from the cradle to the grave.' "Yet, it is for its ability to afford pleasure under saddle that this great horse has become favorably known throughout the world; and in this somewhat effete and blasé motor age in which we live today, men and women are turning in increasing numbers to the Tennessee Walking Horse as the seasons roll by to find pleasure and healthful exercise that no luxurious car can give.

"For the sheer delight of riding and for beneficial diversion in the saddle, this horse give the maximum of human enjoyment and stands supreme in the equine world for its contribution. There is no labor in handling this gentle-mannered animal which responds to light reining—no exertion is called for to cope with a hard and rough gait, for the gaits of the Tennessee Walking Horse are all 'free and easy' and they give comfort and relaxation to the rider without any appreciable degree of fatigue after hours of continuous riding . . . These rocking chair gaits have been bred into these horses throughout the century and more of their existence.

"The Tennessee Walking Horse has three gaits—the flat-foot walk, the running walk and the canter . . . The flat-foot walk is a square on four corners; it is bold and is a step of perfect symmetry, yet it is executed with an ease and grace which will carry one for four to five miles an hour with rest to the horse and comfort to the rider."The running walk, the gait of supreme pleasure to the man or woman of skill as a rider, is the leading and most popular movement of the Tennessee Walking Horse. It is a four-cornered gait and is started like the flat-foot walk; but as speed is increased, the horse over-steps the front foot with the back foot by from six to eighteen inches. The more 'stride' the horse has, the better 'Walker' it is considered to be; for this gives the rider a feeling that he or she is gliding through the air as if propelled by some powerful but smooth-running machine. Yet, this gait is so easy and so moderate that after many hours of continuous riding one feels as fresh as the morning breeze.

"In this running walk, the jar or jolt of the horse's back is eliminated by the light spring of its limbs, the motion of its feet and the nod of its head . . . This gait is so smooth the rider might easily carry a glass of water in his or her hand without spilling even a drop. All Walking Horses relax certain muscles when doing the running walk as they nod their heads in rhythmic timing, swing their ears in perfect motion, and even snap their teeth in corresponding measure.

"In the canter the horse gives one an abundance of ease with lots of spring and rhythm, and with just the proper rise and fall to afford a thrill from sitting the saddle . . . and there is ever a grace and beauty when the horse does this 'rocking chair' motion called the canter ..."
Thus wrote Gilbert Orr, in part, 15 years ago. These innate characteristics of the Tennessee Walking Horse abide today as then. I hope this an¬swers the question of the Gentleman from Cambridge, Mass.

Yours sincerely,
Ben A. Green, Editor, Voice of the
Tennessee Walking Horse Shelbyville,  Tenn.